how to use gamification for non-fiction storytelling

Gamification for non-fiction storytelling?
What could we learn from Gamification techniques to improve our storytelling?
It's not an entirely new way to do so:
use games & learn from games:
• newsgames
• editorial games
• persuasive games
• immersive storytelling

clear goals, milestones: a good story has a clear goal, every paragraph is a clear milestone
• well known rules: how to read this story?
• room for maneuver: let your reader find his/her own way through the story - or at least give some options
• transparency: be transparent on what do we know, what we don't know

If journalists use Gamification in their storytelling -
these 3 features are the most challenging:
• instant feedback for our audience while reading a story
• challenge our audience and don't make it too easy, too simple
• do things the hard way and therefore urge our readers out of their "comfort zone"

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Storytelling
How to apply this to storytelling?
• novelty: that's our job to deliver news
• challenge our audience: with new angles of a story, unknown heroes ... and?
• think creatively: "surprise your readers" - one of the oldest rules in journalism
• do things the hard way: as journalists we're focused on telling stories the most comfortable way
• - is it Gamification to urge our readers out of their "comfort zone"?
ulfgruener.com/edu

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ulfgruener.de | 201572
Storytelling
How to apply this to storytelling?
• clear goals, milestones: a good story has a clear goal, every paragraph is a clear milestone
• well known rules: how to read this story?
• room for maneuver: let your reader find his/her own way through the story - or at least give some options
• transparency: be transparent on what do we know, what we don't know *
ulfgruener.com/edu
* Dan Gillmor, 2009: "Transparency would be a core element of our journalism. One example of many: every print
article would have an accompanying box called "Things We Don't Know," a list of questions our journalists
couldn't answer in their reporting. TV and radio stories would mention the key unknowns. Whatever the medium,
the organisation's website would include an invitation to the audience to help fill in the holes, which exist in every
story." http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/oct/02/dan-gillmor-22-rules-news

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ulfgruener.de | 201573 ulfgruener.com/edu
more key features of games:
(quotes from MasterClass eSports & Gamification, Berlin, March 2016,
Eurovision Academy & Institut für Ludologie)
• "personal path to mastery": how could a story be a path to mastery?
by making sense, explaining sth, telling new angles of a topic ... and what else?
• level up - more, better, increasing complexity: challenge your audience,
don't hesitate to tell complex stories ... and what else?
• overview: help navigating through the story at any time and any place,
this is also indispensable to give room for maneuver ... and what else?
• shop: offer individual add-ons to your story ... and what else?

74.
ulfgruener.de | 201574
Storytelling
If journalists use Gamification in their storytelling –
these 3 features are the most challenging:
• instant feedback for our audience while reading a story
• challenge our audience and don't make it too easy, too simple
• do things the hard way and therefore urge our readers out of their "comfort zone"
ulfgruener.com/edu